I just became the Pirate King, and you're telling me I also time-traveled at the same time.

Chapter 1103 Judgment on the Monkey

He wasn't worried about Jiang Yan's injuries—in the world of cultivation, getting injured is commonplace; breaking a few bones and resting for a few days is all it takes.

What worried him was something else entirely—Jiang Yan was the only one who could enter the cave to retrieve the pill; if Jiang Yan collapsed, the pill could not be retrieved.

As for himself, he couldn't defeat Sun Wukong in a short time. Sun Wukong's stamina was unfathomable, and Chi Dao was almost at his limit.

He made a judgment in his mind.

This judgment took him about half a breath.

Then he did something that surprised everyone – he stabbed the red sword into the ground and rapidly formed hand seals in front of his chest.

He formed the hand seals so fast that his fingers left afterimages in the air, and all eight seals were completed within three breaths.

As he completed the last seal, all the array patterns on the Crimson Blade lit up, but this time it wasn't the dark red battle light that shone, but a dazzling, almost white, blazing light.

The three notches on the blade began to heal under the blazing light—not a true healing, but rather the blade itself was decomposing, burning, and releasing its last remaining power.

"Jiang Yan!" Master Chifeng roared.

Upon hearing the shout, Jiang Yan did not hesitate and leaped to the side with all his might.

His body crashed into the pile of rubble beside the pool, splashing water and stones everywhere.

Master Chifeng gripped the hilt of the Crimson Blade, pulled it from the ground, and then used all his demonic power to hurl the Crimson Blade at Sun Wukong.

The Crimson Blade transformed into a ten-foot-thick crimson pillar of light in the air.

At the core of the pillar of light was the nearly shattered crimson blade itself, surrounded by all the blade energy released from its own burning.

Where the beam of light passed, a scorch mark half a foot deep was burned into the ground, and a large cloud of white mist rose from the pool as the beam swept past, so thick that one could not see their own hand in front of their face.

This strike isn't meant to injure, but to cut off the path.

Master Chifeng knew he couldn't defeat Sun Wukong in a short time, but this strike could at least hold him off for a moment.

As he threw the crimson blade, Master Chifeng retreated rapidly, grabbing Jiang Yan by the back of his collar with one hand and lifting him up from the pile of rubble, while tossing him into the air with the other.

A silver light flew out from his sleeve—it was the flying boat they had come in on.

The airship unfurled in the air, its silvery-white, willow-leaf-shaped hull reflecting a blinding light in the sunlight.

Master Chifeng grabbed Jiang Yan and leaped onto the deck of the flying boat.

The pillar of light formed by the Crimson Blade struck Sun Wukong.

Sun Wukong did not dodge the attack.

It wasn't that he couldn't avoid it, but rather that there was a troop of monkeys behind him.

He stood firmly on his feet, holding his golden cudgel horizontally in front of him, and took the final blow from the red blade head-on.

The crimson beam of light struck the golden cudgel, producing a deafening roar.

The beam of light exploded on the golden cudgel, splitting into four smaller beams that scattered in all directions—one shot into the pool, blasting a three-zhang-deep crater at the bottom; one shot into the mountain wall, drilling a three-chi-diameter hole in it; one shot into the sky, exploding in the clouds and shattering a cloud into pieces; and the last one shot towards Chu Yang's direction.

Chu Yang dodged to the side, the beam of light grazing his back, leaving a red mark on his back from the residual heat of the blade's energy, and a wisp of smoke rose from his clothes.

The beam of light shone on the mountain wall behind him, causing rocks to shatter and debris to fall like rain.

When the roar subsided and the pillar of light dissipated, Master Chifeng and Jiang Yan were no longer there.

The airship drew a silver arc in the air and sped off to the north.

The flying boat left a crooked flight path behind it—not because there was anything wrong with the flying boat itself, but because Master Chifeng's hands were trembling when he was piloting it.

The final blow, the hurled crimson blade, had exhausted most of his demonic power; he was only able to stand by sheer willpower.

The speed of the airship continued to decrease, gradually dropping from its maximum speed to a normal speed, and then continuing to descend.

When the flying boat reached the sea about thirty miles away from Huaguo Mountain, the bottom of the flying boat scraped the sea surface, splashing up a spray of water.

Master Chifeng managed to raise the flying boat and stabilize it at a height of ten zhang above the sea.

Jiang Yan lay on the deck, his broken sword still tucked into its sheath at his waist.

His clothes were soaked in blood—Chu Yang's last punch had shattered one of his ribs. The ribs hadn't damaged his internal organs, but the subcutaneous bruising spread rapidly, turning the skin of his entire right chest cavity bluish-purple.

He stared at the sky above the flying boat, his breathing short and rhythmic—this was the breathing technique of the Tiangang Sect, using short breaths to alleviate pain.

"Master," he said, his voice hoarse.

Master Chifeng stood in front of the ship's rudder, one hand gripping the wheel and the other hanging at his side.

The web between the thumb and forefinger of that drooping hand was completely torn open—not just a cut, but a rip from repeated shocks that had damaged the skin and muscles of the web, revealing the white bone underneath.

Blood dripped from his fingertips onto the deck of the airship, flowing down the patterns on the deck.

"Don't speak," said Master Chifeng. "Adjust your breathing."

"That person," Jiang Yan continued, ignoring him, "that person named Chu Yang."

There was something gray about him.

The penetrating pupil cannot see clearly.

Master Chifeng remained silent for a few moments.

He recognized the power of the Barrier-Breaking Eye, but also its limitations.

There are only two kinds of things that the Barrier-Breaking Eye cannot see through—one is an existence whose cultivation level far exceeds that of the caster, and the other is a power that does not belong to the conventional scope of this world.

Chu Yang clearly doesn't belong to the former category, so he can only be the latter.

"Let's go back first," said Master Chifeng. "We'll talk about it when we get back to the sect."

The airship continued flying north.

The waves on the sea surface were pressed into a long white trail by the wind brought up by the airship. After the airship passed, the trail slowly subsided and merged back into the boundless blue.

The battle on Flower Fruit Mountain has ended.

Sun Wukong moved the golden cudgel away from in front of him.

There was a noticeable scorch mark on the staff—the mark left by the final blow from the Crimson Blade.

The scorch mark was about the size of a palm, and a faint wisp of smoke was still rising from its surface.

He ran his finger across the scorch mark, and black powder clung to his fingertip. He put his finger under his nose, smelled it, and then shook off the powder.

"This knife is not bad." He shrunk the golden cudgel and put it back in his ear. "It's just that the person using it is no good."

Chu Yang walked up the gravel slope and bent down to check on the one-eyed old monkey.

The one-eyed old monkey was still lying there, and the blue-eyed old monkey stayed by its side, pressing its chest with its front paws to help it breathe.

The one-eyed old monkey's eyes were half-open and half-closed, and its breathing was more stable than before, but with each inhale, a wet, rattling sound still came from deep within its chest.

Chu Yang squatted down, placed his hand on the old monkey's chest, and closed his eyes to sense it.

The ribs were not broken, but there was a tiny crack in the sternum, less than half an inch from the heart.

If that kick had been a fraction more off-center or a fraction more forceful, the old monkey's heart would have been pierced.

He opened his eyes, took out a small cloth bag from his sleeve, opened the bag, and inside were a few dried herb leaves.

He crushed the leaves, stuffed them into the old monkey's mouth, and closed its mouth with his fingers, making it swallow the herb.

"It will be alright," he said to the old monkey.

The old monkey's one eye twitched as it looked at him, and herbal juice, dark green and with a bitter smell, dripped from the corner of its mouth.

Sun Wukong walked over and squatted down in front of the one-eyed old monkey.

He looked down at the old monkey—the tuft of black bear fur on its chest was gone, blown away by the wind to some unknown place.

He reached out and patted the old monkey on the head, the force as light as touching a leaf.

"I'll teach you how to fight later," Sun Wukong said. "If you don't learn it, practice more until you do."

Something lit up in the one-eyed old monkey's single eye.

I don't know if it was the light of tears or just reflected sunlight.

It touched Sun Wukong's ankle with its still-movable front paw, and the tip of the paw drew a crooked circle on Sun Wukong's skin—the gesture it used to represent "mountain" when it first met Chu Yang.

The mountain is Huaguo Mountain.

In this old monkey's mind, mountains are the highest, hardest, and most reliable things.

It's using this gesture to say, "You are the mountains."

Sun Wukong stood up and turned to look at the monkey troop.

The monkeys, who had been injured, instinctively scattered and hid when they poked their heads out from all directions. Now that the battle was over, they were gathering together one by one.

The stone climbed up from the bottom of the mountain wall. Its chest was still aching, but it insisted on walking to the one-eyed old monkey, sitting down and using its body to shield the old monkey from the wind.

The other monkeys gathered around and sat in a circle on the scree slope, surrounding the one-eyed old monkey in the middle.

No one organized it, no one directed it, they just did it on their own.

The little monkey that Sun Wukong had flicked on the forehead emerged from behind an old monkey, clutching a green wild fruit in its paw—the kind of wild fruit that's so sour it makes your teeth ache.

It placed the wild fruit next to the one-eyed old monkey's paw, then retreated and hid behind the old monkey, only revealing its two round, black eyes.

"We need to reseal the entrance." Chu Yang stood up and looked at the entrance to the cave.

The large rock had been burned to pieces by Master Chifeng's sword energy, and the cave entrance was wide open, with the aura of the Golden Core continuously surging out from within.

The aura was stronger than ever before—because the seal on the cave had been loosened by the shockwave during the battle, and the spiritual energy of the Golden Core was leaking out at a rate several times faster than before.

"The spiritual energy is dissipating too quickly."

If it's not sealed off, it won't be long before all the monsters within a hundred miles can smell it.

"Why seal it off?" Sun Wukong said. "We're not sealing it off anymore."

Chu Yang turned to look at him.

"I've thought about it." Sun Wukong reached into his ear, took out the golden cudgel again, and twirled it in his hand twice. "The golden elixir has been buried underground for ten thousand years, and the seal is almost worn away."

Sealing the entrance is just self-deception; what's meant to leak will still leak.

Rather than letting it leak away for nothing, let the monkeys take turns going down to suck it up.

They absorb as much as they can; the spiritual energy they dissolve becomes their own cultivation, which is better than letting it rot in the ground.

Chu Yang remained silent for a moment.

"It's too strong."

The stone can support the weight of an incense stick for a while, but the other monkeys can't even last half an incense stick.

"Then let's use half an incense stick," Sun Wukong said. "Half an incense stick will have the same effect."

Half an incense stick a day, fifty incense sticks a day for one hundred days.

"The spiritual energy of fifty incense sticks is enough to transform the bones and muscles of an ordinary monkey." He glanced at the stone sitting next to the one-eyed old monkey. "The stone can add time."

Its demonic bones have been initially activated; its meridians are wider than other monkeys, allowing it to withstand more.

Chu Yang looked at Sun Wukong and then nodded.

In the distance, the flying boat finally flew out of the sight of Huaguo Mountain over the sea.

Master Chifeng raised the flying boat's altitude again and soared into the clouds.

Moisture from the clouds hit the windproof fins of the flying boat, condensing into water droplets that flowed down the barrier.

Jiang Yan had already sat up, leaning against the gunwale of the flying boat, and was slowly drawing something on the scabbard of his right hand with his left hand. It was an extremely simple basic array pattern, the kind that novice disciples use to stop bleeding.

After the array pattern was finished, the bleeding from the wound on his right wrist stopped.

"That monkey," Jiang Yan suddenly spoke, "is not a great demon."

Master Chifeng remained silent.

He was waiting for Jiang Yan to finish speaking.

"There is an upper limit to the aura of a great demon."

"Great demons can sense each other's strength because their cultivation paths all come from the same system." Jiang Yan raised his eyes, looking at the back of True Man Chifeng, "But I can't sense the upper limit of that monkey."

When I looked at him through the broken-barrier eye, what I saw was something compressed to the size of a fist burning wildly, but that was only a layer on the surface of his body.

Looking inside, you can't see anything.

It's like standing on the edge of a cliff and looking down; you can't see the bottom.

Master Chifeng tightened his grip on the steering wheel.

"You mean his cultivation level is more than that of a Great Demon?"

"I don't know." Jiang Yan shook his head. "What's above the Great Demon? There's no record of it in the Heavenly Gang Sect's records."

But I know one thing: if he really is a being above the Great Demon, then the reason we are able to leave alive today is not because we are strong enough, but because he has no intention of killing.

The cabin of the flying boat remained quiet for a long time.

Master Chifeng looked down at the wound on his tiger's mouth. The blood at the wound had congealed, and the dark red scab was wrinkled up on his skin.

"After returning to the sect, I will go directly to Zhenyue Hall to see the sect leader," said True Man Chifeng. "You go back and recuperate."

Today's events, especially your assessment of that monkey—I will report them all together.

The airship passed through the clouds and continued flying north.

Inside the Zhenyue Hall in the Iron Sword Mountain Range, Xuan Chengzi was standing in front of the Heavenly Mystery Pillar.

The red light on the Heavenly Mystery Pillar began to fluctuate violently about half an hour ago. First, its brightness increased several times, and the entire copper pillar turned as red as an iron bar just pulled out of a furnace. Then it suddenly dimmed, until only a faint halo remained. Then it brightened again, repeating this process three times.

After the third fluctuation ended, the red light stabilized at a slightly dimmer brightness than before, but the frequency of the fluctuations increased significantly.

Xuan Chengzi observed the changes on the Heavenly Mystery Pillar with a calm expression.